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Arena Programme 2014

As well as Elvis Week in Memphis and Bad Nauheim in Germany, there’s also the additional departure to Memphis & Tupelo with the Official Elvis Presley Fan Club of GB to celebrate the 60th anniversary of That’s All Right – the birth of rock n’roll. And they also have a special Thanksgiving departure to Memphis & New York, staying at the Warwick Hotel and an exclusive special guest Alfred Wertheimer, the photographer who took those amazing photographs of Elvis at 21.
Totally new is an exclusive luxury Elvis cruise, onboard the American Queen paddle steamer, with Memphis and New Orleans included. Plus there’s a visit Graceland Randers in Denmark, where there is a marvellous Elvis museum, housed within a replica Graceland. And there’s lots more to come over the coming weeks.

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rock and roll....... It's gospel with rythm and blues ( in my opion als a vbit country). Bill haley not sounded "black" in his music. Also not gospel. But Elvis in 1954 elvis made a combi of country with rythm and blues. Rock-a- billy music. Yes rock and roll

Gorse, indeed I think the discussion point here is related to the usage of the word 'birth'. I would rather state that it was the breakthru. Though others made RnR before him, he transformed it into something of a much higher level with a mider audience too. Indeed, Bill Haley was already there and others also recorded essential stuff. When Elvis came around it turned into a real definitive style.

Natha and Miikael69 - Your sentiments are fully realised even by the most sane anti Elvis individual, but that is not the issue. Yes let's celebrate the recording of That's Alll Right Mama, the debut professional recording of a musical phenomenon, but not as the birth of Rock'n Roll - maybe the birth of Rockabilly but that is another discussion.

Rock 'n Roll still exists, only in a different form. There are many other contemporary rebellic artists who symolize future music. For instance, Justin Bieber, Lil Bow Wow, Miley Cyrus, Paris Hilton, Bouke etcetera..

Well stated Mikael69. Elvis made it what it turned out: a world wide phenomenon addressing all youngsters at that time. Therewith he also opened up the gateway for all modern music that sprung from that revolution. Hence his influence is still seen, felt and experienced in many ways, whether people admit it or not. It is interesting that for decades artists sort of denied that, whilst in this time frame more artists happily refer to their admiration for and inspiration from Elvis.

why not forgetting about the songs and see the cultural bit; as long as it was sung by black musician it was ... black music. before Elvis, the "white" played rock n roll but this was clean, sanitized E made it sound dirty, soulful etc. said differently he was the white guy who sounded black and acc. to Philipps he was the first one to do so . so E made it !

Well said ' sitdown ' as claims that this was the beginning of rock 'n roll is totally misplaced and antagonises many folk, and rightly so. Elvis never made the claim, and no one has really agreed on that defining moment although 'Rocket 88' has many supporters. What can be claimed is that our boy was the leading exponent of the genre that took it successfully to the summit of awareness to the World.

That's allright the "birth of Rock and roll"? With all the due respect towards Elvis Presley's legacy we have to consider this: "Rock and roll emerged as a defined musical style in the United States in the early to mid-1950s. It derived most directly from the rhythm and blues music of the 1940s, which itself developed from earlier blues, boogie woogie, jazz and swing music, and was also influenced by gospel, country and western, and traditional folk music. Rock and roll in turn provided the main basis for the music that, since the mid-1960s, has been generally known as rock music.

The phrase rocking and rolling originally described the movement of a ship on the ocean, but was used by the early twentieth century, both to describe a spiritual fervor and as a sexual analogy. Various gospel, blues and swing recordings used the phrase before it became used more frequently – but still intermittently – in the late 1930s and 1940s, principally on recordings and in reviews of what became known as rhythm and blues music aimed at a black audience. In 1951, Cleveland-based disc jockey Alan Freed began playing this music style while popularizing the term rock and roll to describe it.[1]

Various recordings that date back to the 1940s have been named as the first rock and roll record, including the frequently cited 1951 song "Rocket 88", although some have felt it is too difficult to name one record. Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock" is often cited as the first rock and roll record to achieve significant commercial success and was joined in 1955 by a number of other records that pioneered the genre."